c-span2, and as 2012 draws to a close, one of the things we like to do is look back at the year in nonfiction books and look ahead to 2013. joining us to help us are two guests in our new york studio, sarah weinman is the news director for "publishers marketplace" and bob minitz heymer is the book reviewer and reporter for "usa today." ..

publishing operations, the google settlement moving forward in different directions. those olympic first stage apportion of bush publishing news. on the nonfiction front is a very strong year. in particular receipt of the best of 2012 list dominated by the likes of catherine coos behind beautiful forever is the witch was the winner of the national book award. the ongoing biography of lyndon johnson and andrew solomon's fire from the tree, only recently published over 900 each companion he had the king of different child-rearing examples of special needs children. so these two books on a very substantial books, but they're the tip the iceberg of nonfiction.

>> host: minzesheimer, same question. >> guest: it was a big year for dead presidents. she remember robert harris is the fourth of five on monday june 10, which was just an incredible act of both reporting and writing about a secret 20th century history. dirt since goodman spoke spoken a team of rivals in 2005 is back on the bestsellers list thanks to steven spielberg's movie, linking. these are two number 20 or so, pretty remarkable for three spoke out so alone. also jon meacham's new biography, thomas jefferson, when you think there's not going to be said about thomas jefferson, sinai-grace the popular, readable, somewhat controversial book.

so presidents in the news as well. >> host: it's hard to imagine that presidents do not talk about o'reilly and his new books coming killing again and doing can indeed commit this year. >> guest: bill o'reilly and martin duke guard -- i actually interviewed o'reilly about his process. his partner disagrees to us, he does the writing. the idea is to read history like a thriller, not an academic sense. there's very few footnotes they appeared you have to trust where he got his information from. he's promising to announce his next book, which in the right of the fashion is going to blow the wall stand and be the biggest book in nonfiction history. we'll see if the data. his point, o'reilly's point is history is often treated to dry

leaf. but it need not be so there's a lot of personality and policies in his book. >> host: a lot of books, current presidents and this year is no exception for president obama. rachel swansboro ran about mrs. o'connor called american tapestry. jodi cantor wrote the eponymous and david marinus first half of his biography of president obama, barack obama the story came out as well. >> guest: yes, whenever there is a sitting president it is a print for publishers who can jump on a bandwagon in publishes many books as possible. in the interesting because it helped them them to be shouted to a student in a year to his early organizing days and really

did a thorough job in terms of talk with a full plethora of people in his early life. jodi cantor did a lot of recording an investigation with your book about the marriage between barack and michelle obama and rachel swarms took a larger view, looking at the first lady and her lurcher ancestry in putting together a lurcher story is the result. >> host: bob, go ahead, please. >> guest: i was going to jump in. of those three may paper with marinus. in my review i read of this exhaustive and exhausting. he goes into every detail and his and his obama is going off to harvard or is just entered harvard law school. so it's very much a coming-of-age biography, early part of the president's life and

was very well researched. the jodi cantor book i thought was a bit force. unless you're part of the marriage, it's awful hard to understand. chanter try to make the case that michelle o'connell is far more political than she was going to add-on and there was infighting in the up on the way kos. rachel cirencester was valuable because although the tension on the first but president because his weight ancestors came from ulcer, there were no slaves and his family. michelle obama had slaves and weight ancestors is a great american complexity in how we reduce rates to black-and-white, but it really isn't. >> just to very quickly mentioned, barack obama the

story, but to be traveled to kenya with mr. marinus. we did a lot of taping over there, so you can see all of that in the special we did on her website, booktv.org. use the search function in the upper left hand corner watch some of the footage. it was quite a trip to kenya to see that background. yes, sir. >> guest: one of the great person is reporting reporting was he deconstruct it obama's memoir, faith of our fathers. dreams from our fathers. i think i got john mccain -- i had the fathers part right. which he wrote and 95 or so. 95 or 96. marinus went back to less accurate in the book, so it's a

great companion to read if you read obama's memoir. >> host: there's some publishers, sentinel cognitive umt, that put out a budget anti, david limbaugh the great destroyer, i am the change and do nice to see obama's america are quite critical of president obama. trained to commit to these sell well? >> guest: they do because they serve right your wrong light as a counterpoint. many readers wish to buy and another results have a very active audience in a president obama has been reelected, i'm sure these publishers with conservative in prince or conservative and crime will continue to produce books that sell well because they will appeal to an audience that

demands these books. >> host: bob minzesheimer can have you interviewed critical authors? >> guest: no. going back has not recently taken on exactly president obama. it's sort of interesting. who's ever in power in the white house, the opposite would of course i does better. a democratic in the white house tends to do better. then there's the conservative under president bush, they tend to do better. in fact, bush at one point being questioned about jobs are sent and says look what i'm doing for the book industry because there were so many books out critical of him come assorted middle of the second term. >> guest: and the irony was

his own book, decision points several years ago if it wasn't the best-selling nonfiction book of that year was awfully close. >> host: the whole theory that people vote at the bookstore in much smaller numbers. but you show your alliance by buying up woke pedigrees. more polemical books about by people who cruise the authors. >> host: real-time policy books came out in james mance, the struggle. jeffrey toobin, the oath, obama white house versus the supreme court and michael grunwald, new deal: hidden story of changing the obama era along with bob woodward's, the price of politics. i want to ask, did that word were its most recent book at the attention most of his books get?

>> my feeling is that it got initial attention but was crowded out by the nature of the new seiko happening so fast. in my mind through a couple of nuggets not reported before, but there was sent that many other ones that emerged after one or two comes to care for the book lost its momentum. i'm sure bob will have been equally subsisted answer on this, too. >> what are you comparing it to? it was not his most commercially successful book. so it thinks are touched on two things. one is the new seiko has so speeded up in the other fact it was the topic. it was about negotiations of the budget, the dead. that's not exactly an exciting second topic for a lot of people. i opposed to his books on maneuvering the bush white house

over the war, which i think would have more interest. >> guest: one thing i wanted to bring up this trans gentle to these particular books, but it's an emerging trend in 2012 is the lack of current event topics are not just the domain of lurcher nonfiction titles to take a very long time to produce by lurcher publishers, but the advent of shorter forms digital books through companies by the likes of eyeliner were newspapers and magazines that event to the e-book market. in fact, "usa today" launched its own e-book called u.s.a. tomorrow. a publisher that any stripe can come to market very early in the timely topics of a political nature as the election season really showed, they could get the news out in a wider way within the e-book than if they had to wait several months or a

year for work. i >> host: i thought michael grunwald new book, the new new deal should've gotten more attention than it did. i found it very and she seen it was not the kind of stuff you are reading the newspapers or magazines or seen discussed in tv. grunwald writes for "time" magazine. he's a nonpartisan and it's an appreciation of what the stimulus not only did good for the economy, but what it means for the environment. it's a story that's gotten lost on the politics. >> host: we have to have your comment as an employee of "usa today." we have to have you comment on u.s.a. tomorrow. guess what i should think sir for her plug for that. the newspaper in september was 30 years old from this little bunch of reporters were sent out to talk to people who could predict what the world be like 30 years from now, which would

leave, what are we talking about, 2042? fare as his little better that than i am. anyway, they made their predictions there was talk about what it means for their industry. we put out a little tab and now that tab is now an e-book, which i think you can buy with a grand total of $1.89. it hasn't really taken off yet. the short form, somewhere between a book and magazine. amazon has been doing them. they can be posted almost immediately. and they sell for two or $3, $4, maybe more. if you have made the sellers list. some have been some fiction. a story she called to him to be a short story and too short to be a novel.

>> host: the war -- the worse i should say continue to produce both, include rashida sunder makin, the war within the war for afghanistan, tom ricks, the generals, the killing of osama bin laden and another book on the killing of osama bin laden is mark alliance, no easy day. the first account to kill osama bin laden. then there's a book that i got a second wind. this is on general david petraeus at paula broadwell. any comments on this books? >> guest: it is funny will do to the book is a formerly lidless title without a second second wind because of course because of resignation and the role and that is exactly why the paperback publication was pushed

to appear but it's done a little bit is take away from the lurcher aspect of these books one-off and focuses a little too much i'm not instead of subject on the book. one thing worth pointing out was a pseudonym for one of the navy seals who is involved in the mission to kill osama bin laden and the book's publisher, penguin press announced that with only weeks to spare. i felt that the state did a brilliant job of marketing a book. of course it didn't help were perhaps it didn't hurt depending on who you ask that markers real name was dutifully revealed that the media, which then caused its own firestorm. but the upshot is many of these books, even can insert needy attention doesn't translate into

sales. where they did phenomenally low. the other thing that is worth pointing out, too, is anything to do with the killing of osama bin laden is back in the news again with the upcoming movie zero dark 30 to wreck it by kathryn bigelow and written by mark bowles, the same people responsible for the hurt locker. it's interesting to see the cia is cooperating, but the account of mark owen spoke. so taking all these things together, piece together a comprehensive of what happens is redoing rashomon. >> guest: according to wired list, it did not do well in the commercial sense, did not crack our top 481 week.

although there is another title called all in, which was some sort of romance a rabbit to somewhere in there. i haven't read either the nonfiction or the nonfiction. it's an interesting book. fred kaplan called the insurgents and it's about what he considers a new breed of soldier scholar has tried to redefine what the military. should a pitcher is this one his major subjects i think. it will be interesting to see whether the personal scandal bullet died down enough to get back to policy issues that the rule of the military vote the generals. >> guest: simon & schuster pushed up the publication of the book in large part a reaction to the ongoing scandal.

so it's going to be late january and now it's beginning of january. >> host: we want to look at award wonders of 2012, national book awards this admission, catherine who, behind the beautiful forever is one this year. but the other nominees included and appelbaum, passage of power, jamaica martinez, the bookings contact cincinnati-based elite shaheed, house of stone. any comment on this? >> guest: i either anthony sheehy wrote a great deal. i read it just after he had died. she was a writer for the washing can post in "the new york times" and diet related to an asthma attack while covering the civil war in syria. his book is a memoir. he grew up in oklahoma full

places, and american lebanese family. became a reporter and his life mission was to try to explain, which is no easy thing to do. he covered more than an issue for in the course of the first marriage and death buying the family's old ramshackle house somewhere in lebanon. i forget the name of the village and takes a year off to restore the movie almost, which he does with great difficulty. the book, his memoir blends in both lebanese history and its glorious past, which is sadly destroyed or civil war as voices of personal story. so shortly before the book came

out, he died. he missed about 40, 45. >> host: sarah weinman. >> guest: well, i feel looking at this list, and unmitigated searcher talk about how much i adore the book. i made a comment on twitter just kathryn booze did every single best of 2012 book it would be fine with me. it's a phenomenal piece of report it, but literature which he writes with a tremendous sense of empathy. she's a new yorker staff writer and previous recipient of the macarthur genius grant. her husband is a man and she spends at least three years in a spot right outside of mumbai, essentially chronicling these people's lives and seeing how

they coped unbeaten on the periphery of great industrial change, but also struggling with deep poverty. she presents their lives and reports on them and the way that obviously takes into account the tremendous suffering, but also shows tremendous humanity, moments of candor, moments of great familial joy about some of the people involved go through. i felt so unbelievably moved reading it. it's a book that frankly i could not put down either. i just had to keep reading. i see why to implement national book awards, but why so many people have responded to it, why sold very well am i will take its place as one of the very best books published in the last two years. >> host: if i remember right, she's not in the book at all. it's old-fashioned reporting done incredibly well.

>> host: and sarah weinman at publishers marketplace mentioned the best of lists are coming out by publications "washington post," the economist, et cetera have been abrogated at booktv.org. you'll be able to see a lot of the best of 2012 books list. they are under our section called news about books. pulitzers this year, stephen greenblatt won for general nonfiction this word history delete many maribel, one for malcolm x and biography or autobiography. john lewis gaddis, george f. kennan and american life. what is this word about? >> guest: to swerve if i remember right, i admit i dipped into the book when it came out. it's fascinating.

it was a little on the side of being i don't want to say -- intellectual. i don't mean to say that dismissively. that is about a palm. help me here. do you remember the name of the palm? we are funky and this exam here. rediscovered in the renaissance and then it changed the way it was published i guess you would say. printed or something. >> host: i didn't mean to but she was the spot there. >> guest: the cultures where did that and put in more modern take on life and the fear of dying is to put the fear of dying, which is far more

predominate and stops people from doing things prior. at least that's the part of this work. >> host: sarah weinman, if a book is nominated or wins a national book award are nominated and wins a pulitzer, does it change sales? >> guest: as an example to answer your question, the pulitzer prize did not award a prize in fiction this year, which is the first time that it happened since the late 1970s. there was a huge uproar largely because certainly for fiction winners the pulitzer does have an appreciable effect on sales. paul harding when he won the fiction prize for his debut novel, he'd been published by very tiny press club does the literary press and in the wake of the pulitzer are not only did the books almost 100,000 copies, but his next novel will be published by random house in september 2013. so it's completely changed his

career and sister checked three. jennifer egan is another example when she won the pulitzer for the squad, she sold already, but she's definitely a a mid-list writer in the wake of her prose to win, she's the entrenched as one of the most sought-after writers in american literature right now. so not a working the fiction prize this year, certainly spent a lot of shockwaves. it'll be interesting to see if they repeat in 2013 or if they will learn from that mistake and make sure an author with the fiction prize this time out. >> guest: a lot of libraries will check their holdings and see if they have the books and if they don't have the books, they will order those books. it doesn't make it a best-seller, but establishes and at a different realm. prices are most important when the person is not that well

known. some unlike jennifer egan's suddenly establishes them increase curiosity about them. >> host: several members of congress have for books including senator ran paul, representative john lewis wrote another book, across that rich about his experience. senator marco rubio, biography and american son. representative tim ryan, an inflammation. her single practice can reduce stress, improve performance and recapture the american spirit. a little off the beaten path for members of congress, senator tom coburn, the debt on and robert draper has written a book about congress. do not ask what do we do inside the u.s. house of representatives. do either of you look for these books to make him out by members of congress are politicians? >> guest: i certainly note

them, but a few at least from a standpoint that these books are a way to entrench these of congress not only in positions, but potentially to position them for future runs within their current offices are maybe something different. it seems as if it's more of a calling card and furthering careerist authors. the authors of books is yet another feather in the cap of politicians. deshaies a way of announcing to the public that they are part of the larger conversation. >> host: it's going to sound a little cynical or skeptical. i also wonder how much the book is written by a member of congress given their schedules and the need to raise money. i always remember that they had no horicon wrote the campaign

biography for a patronage job. the whole tradition of campaign books. the beauty of obama's memoir was he wrote it before he was a publication with a little less open anything. as long as he was being touted as the vice presidential candidate, that was when they lost interest and not the. way to feature in the republican party, so he will be going back. >> host: well-known former members of congress and politicians, government officials have it the books this past year putting colin powell and life and leadership. madeleine albright, another book, prague winter: a personal

story of remembrance at work. the late senator arlen specter had another book at april 2012, life among the cannibals and former governor arnold schwarzenegger, total recall. sarah weinman, hottie total recall two? >> guest: as far as i know it did not live up to expectations. that said i understand he had a quite interesting profile pieces of the former governor. >> guest: if you remember, with those who have forgotten after he left the governorship, this is right, he cannot but governor schwarzenegger had an affair with his housekeeper who had fathered a son. and that led to his wife, maria

shriver and president kennedy involved in everything. i think filing for divorce. city comes out with 600 pages or so. if everything arnold schwarzenegger has ever done from growing up in a time australia and the bodybuilding. pages and pages about hottie building. it is incredible -- and some is an incredible american immigrant story. he becomes a movie star and then becomes governor of california. meanwhile, this is an affair with the housekeeper about five pages in the book. and he deals with it doesn't say much, makes a mistake, regrets it in those situations. i got an interview with him on

the phone friday before the book was coming out. he already agreed to be on 60 minutes and they had a lot more time. midway through the interview he said i don't -- and i cannot do arnold well. he said i don't like to read this interview is going because he thought to many questions have to do with the housekeeper, not about his accomplishments as governor. if you like arnold shorts and bigger, it's all there. it briefly made our bestseller lists and then went away. >> host: political pundits. we get the political pundits books every year including charles murray's coming apart, state of white america. glenn beck howard, america would be a racial motto, drift and and coulter, mugged. did either of you pick up any of these books? there was the best seller for a couple weeks, don't they?

>> guest: yeah, they do. i'm looking specifically at the and coulter book. she spoke untruths which publishers upon point because anytime you put a book with her name and her face on the cover, it would have a karen t. fail well into six figures. what time the sale strike has been dropping, dropping, dropping it seems as if she's had to come up our rhetoric and argumentative streak to sell fewer and fewer copies. so it will be interesting to see what she does for her next book and how far she's willing to go to make a buck and sell a book to speak. >> host: ipaq drift by rachel mandel went beyond the usual pundit book. it's questioning american military power and a lot of it is not written from a liberal date. she is an unabashed liberal, but

she's on tv. i think she has a phd in something, like lyrical science or some thing. i think charles murray would not want to be called a pundit. he's famous for the controversy over the bell curve. this looks that great working-class to separate classroom raise which complicates everything. you look at how the values of the working class has gone down hill and is a way to alleviate, adopted middle-class values while the working middle class is a complex argument. two places to describe these things. it's an interesting, provocative book, somewhat more than someone ranting and rallying.

>> host: charles murray is a scholar at the american enterprise institute as well. probably not fair to call him a political pundit. he launched his own imprint, but his talk show is off the air. can you see the result in his sales? >> guest: as far as i can tell, glenn beck, what he's been doing since he left fox is trying to build a brand that reaches a very dedicated community, not only through a satellite oriented radio show. he is a new site called the police. he has other things going on through his website. other brand opportunities. he does have this dedicated imprint through simon & schuster. so i feel like his philosophy has been moving toward trying to reach the same dedicated, loyal following over and over he can and build on that a little bit

at a time rather than necessarily go for the more mass reach that fox had because this way i suppose he could do what he does best. what is interesting to see if he has shifted what he has done over the last few years and no doubt he will continue to adapt his persona over the next year or so. >> host: >> guest: he has a new novel out, which is an attack on the u.n., but his previous novel, the overturned conspiracy is by glenn beck and two other people. sometimes you see novels written by two people. james patterson been a great example of that. our history books. usually you don't see three people who sort of gets to the committee writing. i asked an interview, who wrote the book?

ira at the. did she sit at the keyboard? know, these guys did that. i sort of supervised. so it's sort of a team effort. to call him an author, he might dispute this, but it's sort of a part of this whole brand marketing. he has a newsletter, a cable show, he says own media and higher. whether fox forced them out or he jumped i'm not clear. she's very popular in the book sells. he writes about christmas, politics. >> host: prior to taping this interview with trey and two and minzesheimer, we asked them for their picks. and bob minzesheimer, one was kevin powers, the yellow birds. >> guest: i don't look tv doesn't do a lot of fiction, but the yellow birds is a novel.

kevin powers serves in iraq. he joined the army -- one of these incredible stories. grew up in richmond, virginia, joined the army out of high school, ended up serving in iraq, came back and also have this love of poetry. came back, went to school, undergraduate mfa somewhere either side to side beautiful novel because it's a novel about war and destruction toward and what war does to people. it's about two young kids from virginia. he says it's not all that autobiographical about what happened to him in iraq. but it's a great sense of what it was like to be fair for people who have not been there and it's called the yellow birds. it's a remarkable accomplishment. >> host: sarah weinman, david

nassau's, the pastry art. >> guest: i'm almost done reading it. for whatever reason i read fiction must bashers anon diction, especially because it's a thorough and comprehensive biography of joseph t. kennedy, the father of president kennedy, many other kennedys heading the sec. he was the master to london in the hollywood film industry was very active in the roosevelt administration. sometimes the relationship between him and the president could take contentious and i feel nassau has done an excellent job of putting together so much research. he spent within six years on this book going to archive after archive, crosschecking, fat checking. one thing that seems to improve defensively with joe kennedy pisani bootlegger. i really, really admire the

scholarship and a very quiet to spend the many weeks with this book. >> host: discovering new things about the kennedy family is just astounding. we were talking about an alternative history thing. but if nixon, what if they had never been president and we start thinking about the thousands of books that never would have been written about it but maybe different books. i once interviewed caroline kennedy edited several books, mostly and some tapes from the white house. caroline kennedy is famous for staying on message. and to get off message attack have you for not only can the bookstore? if she was thinking about it, she wouldn't say anything.

but you can have the entire bookstore devoted to the kennedys. service history can have a skin of section. arnold schwarzenegger spoke had been there. they are househunting and someone shows from the house, an apartment in los angeles, hollywood and the real estate agent said, you know, just as kennedy the for a while and there is a tunnel underneath the house and went forward to gloria swanson's house. he said rhea was both interested and embarrassed by the story. i asked arnold about why he put them in the book, did he think that would embarrass maria? he didn't really answer the question. kennedy bookstore. there is a link in bookstore in chicago. the link in bookstore.

i want to chime in and say that i think a kennedy bookstore would be good. if anything, you could fold in all the cuomo's by virtue of their granted ceasing to exist as to the relationship nonetheless. poster this is maybe not a fair question but if we could but david riley's killing kennedy to david asked us to teach her about kennedy, if bill o'reilly's book would sell, how many copies? a million? to thought us and? at this figure is even close? >> guest: actually, i think you are the love on nasa, but not too low. bill o'reilly's, the killing lincoln book has sold close to 2 million copies. it's been out more than a year, not in paperback, not slowed down. o'reilly talk to an interview with me about more serious

history books as only o'reilly can say. you need to go on vacation and being retired to read their books. his books or 200, 300 pages. you can read them in a couple days. so it depends how much readers want to devote. but here's the thing publishers to acrobatic bank is bigger books pretty much pop out at $35. gusto sometimes 40 -- it signifies the defined. >> guest: you get 300 pages for 25. so if you sold them per page, you know, like meat is sold by the pound, the bigger books get much more for your money and also occupy your brain for a longer period of time. i'll think it really works that

way. the life is not fair. >> guest: it's important because there's almost a hundred stories to fit us, a comprehensive index. where did he get this fat and i can look it up not just in the end takes for the appended nodes, but also book online and do some of my own good down the rabbit hole. it's not that i think each of the text of the book. i'm looking at different sources that were used in creating this book. >> guest: is also the question of how long the book will be read. it can be read for decades. >> guest: it's meant to be definitive. >> guest: as opposed to at the popular this month and then is forgot any hearer so.

this will sound an academic, but important since it is. a lot of publishers do not like, do not like the amount of paper being spent on footnotes. why not just put the footnotes online, which would be something for someone. maybe i'll do that in my next book. although the problem for writers like that of some other sources may not be as strong. if you discover the source is, you may start to doubt some of the stuff in the text. for example, in the killing kennedy book is a scene describing john kennedy and leading up to the assassination. it's not just about the assassination. he's describing the scene where john kennedy is meeting marilyn monroe and being crosspiece

house in florida, a famous party, which moved from frank sinatra's house because kennedy had been warned that frank was involved with mafia figures. you can imagine bill o'reilly nursing all these name. get a sentence that said everyone knew they would sleep with marilyn monroe that night. no attribution. how did you know this? he had a source. the source was an interview in the london daily mail, which is a tabloid in london that have reported this years ago and he said it was confirmed by a secret service agent was at the party, but could not be identified. is that verifiable? sources are important. how a writer knows what about, especially in history is

important. they gloss over that. >> host: it's not just popular history to have one last point that in 2012 in general what many conversations about fact checking and cooperating forces, verifying facts, making sure which you wrote is actually true. all of those things to some degree brought down general layer who for some years have been thought of as one of the rising stars, bragging about neuroscience. his newest book, imagine came out and it turned out he'd fabricated at least one source. he does so copied extensively from earlier writing. so as a result, his publisher had to withdraw the book and remains to be seen but his next move will be and what if any career he will have as a result. >> host: we're running out of time and fortunately, but we want to show you "the new york times" bestseller list hardcover and e-books combined.

this is the nonfiction most weeks on the list. >> host: but his wild by sheryl stayed? >> guest: that was an amazing memoir by women who had previously written a novel called torch. what she did is describe in

retrospect how in her mid-20s, after a failed marriage is and her mother had died, there had been some drug issues. she decided on a whim and she would walk the specific poster allen did so with minimal preparations have described essentially had to reduce long-distance walk broker apart the putter back together again. the big reason why this book was on the bestseller list for so long, even though there had been a great deal of event was i myself read it before publication and certainly oprah winfrey decided to revive her book club. if oprah's book club 2.0. she may not have been nationally syndicated show anymore, but she also has her magazine, the oprah magazine as well as on the economist because when she

showed as the reconstituted book club, it still led to a great uptick in sales and it also meant that straight other books, not just previous novel, torch, but a book of it writes columns called tiny beautiful things that sold rather well. interestingly enough, opera has made her next election in her book club to point out a debut novel called the 12 tribes of patty, a woman who would never previously published fiction before, so she agreed extensively for glossy magazines. >> host: .minzesheimer, let's look at publishing news for this past year. i want to start with the price of e-books. what is the status of the e-book collusion pricing? ask her how much time do i have? >> host: europe about two minutes to get into this.

>> guest: i made a further two s-sierra because this gets extremely complicated. it basically comes down to a battle between publishers and amazon about how cheap e-books will be. sir can jump in if i'm oversimplifying. >> guest: i'll do my best to keep it simple as well. there have been a burgeoning class-action lawsuit, but things came to a head in april when the department of justice sued five or six largest publishers, essentially popovic 66 at random house and apple for what they felt were colluding and e-book prices through what's known as the agency model. very briefly, the agency model said the price is not retailers. before then, retailers like amazon and barnes & noble could set their own prices. the department of justice did not like that. in the wake of the soup, simon & schuster and harpercollins all

settled and now we're finally seeing some fluctuation in those publishers e-book prices. mcmillan, penguin and apple continue to fight the suit are at a trial is set for june 3rd , 2013. the case still is ongoing in court. there's been many legal maneuvering is an estate settlement in all states except minnesota or the leave to to $69 million will be allocated to give back to customers who felt that they pay too high a price and e-books. >> guest: is the day of the 999 e. backs coming back? >> guest: that assumes that $9.99 e-book existed in the first place. it was by the amazon were shifting prices lower and lower the publishers felt they couldn't make any profit. but the agency model enabled them estimate profits. we certainly saw if you look at the bottom line of publishing

earnings report throughout the year, were e-books contributed a very healthy bottom line. what is interesting is that a major publishing story is the impending merger between random house and penguin, and not simply that tober. how that will come about depends on what the department of justice has to say because of penguin is in litigation with them, how can they prove what would essentially create the largest publisher in american history? >> guest: they are complaining against amazon that amazon is trying to sell e-books as cheap as possible to sell candles and that's what they really want to do. they want to sell the kindle. one of the other developments this amazon has got into traditional publishing and is beginning to sign some big name

authors, saying it is using its data. set in the sun is publishers on any levels and creating all kinds of tensions. >> guest: was interesting that amazon publishing of some of the names they felt to be big enough to sort have not sold. penny marshall, was sold for a very high six-figure amount, wildly underperformed end both the new york operation has been getting interestingly enough some critical acclaim from the problem is retailers including earns a noble and independent bookstores are not stocking these titles. amazon publishing operations when it comes to genre fiction, science fiction, promis had been selling quite well because they do very well and e-books. trying to compete with the big six have shown themselves to be a worthy competitor quite yet. that may change in 2013.

>> guest: at e-book sales year-to-date are up nearly 37% while the entire adult trade books are up 10.4%. very quickly, sarah weinman, what happened in a tober with regard to the so-called grupo settlement? >> guest: the grupo settlement as it stands now is still ongoing in respect to the author's guild fighting it out. however, google does reaching a settlement with that segment to longer be fought in court. the suit has been going on for almost eight years if not more. judge denny chin has appealed the court for at least two or three years now and this is one of the last standing cases. i'm sure you'd like to see some resolution in some form of

nobody seems as if the authors guild would like to fight it out. >> host: .minzesheimer, 30 seconds on self-publishing and 2012. >> guest: self-publishing is when you pay to get your book published. you do not get money. you don't get royalties. for years this was looked down upon. anyone could do it. a couple thousand dollars, you too can be an author. the digital world has changed that and suddenly on our list, u.s.a. today's list, self published books that you might not appeal to find, some not even in print, just e-books. i'm running out of time here, but the big barriers was getting them in store. if he didn't have a publisher can meet and have a distribution

channel. in a digital world, that's changing. now publishers have been buying some of these services. it's very complicated because it's all becoming one thing. penguin brought author solutions. hundreds of thousands of books. books that sell 50 copies. most self published books sell less than a hundred copies. every so often one comes a big hit, mostly by word out through the internet. so penguin bought author solutions. simon & schuster competes with penguin now has a deal to her, not sure what they're doing because they're not really publishing books. >> guest: they're essentially wipe out people where they put their name, but author solutions does all the work. >> guest: for readers i guess it's good, more choices. publishers fear what happens when a big-name author decides

to self publish. what happens when james patterson, stephen king decide i'll be my own publisher? it hasn't happened yet. >> host: unfortunately, we're out of time. very quickly we asked both sarah weinman and.minzesheimer into 2013 some of their picks. sarah weinman is looking for lawrence wright going clear the scientology, hollywood and the present of the leaf, nx is answering college he and of course lawrence wright with "the looming tower," some of the books bob minzesheimer is looking forward to. the king years carbaugh spoleto my life, al gore the future and also point out a couple of the books coming out, general stanley mcchrystal has a book coming out. they shared the task and dick cheney of coronary disease.

his book is also coming out in 2013. sarah weinman a publishers marketplace and dog minzesheimer at "usa today," we appreciate your time here on booktv today. >> you don't always find many newspaper editors in any era embraced investigative reporting. we so known for years it's not just economics. is the discomfort that causes in a newsroom. because his troubled son. it's that more than economics. if you r